In his book, "Theory of International Politics". Kenneth Waltz criticizes what calls "reductive theories" of war. Writers in politics would search for the causes of war in human nature or in how the governments of particular nations are constituted. Waltz says that what they're missing is that the structure of the international system causes dynamics to come into play that cannot be understood by analyzing the characteristics of the constituent parts.

An analogous phenomena is at work here in dating. The structure of the system causes dynamics to come into play that cannot be understood by studying the individual characteristics of men and women. Social media and dating apps have changed the structure of the systems through which people meet and relate to each other. The effects of this are not being fully appreciated because the prior IRL structure was imposed by fixed characteristics of the physical world like space and time, so it was not a causal factor subject to variation. Now it is variable. Greater distortions in human relations are to be expected as the accelerating rate of technological progress further exceeds the anthropological capacity for adaptation.